Sarawak – David and Karen Journey

Amazing Borneo

What were we thinking when we were planning the nearly 4 week trip to Malaysia’s Borneo? Borneo is the third largest island in the world. The island is politically divided among three countries: Malaysia and Brunei in the north, and Indonesia to the south. Approximately 73% of the island is Indonesian territory. In the north, the East Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak make up about 26% of the island.

We spent a one week in the state of Sabah, town of Sandakan and nearby rainforest and islands, and a week in the state of Sarawak, town of Kuching. Our flight connections were through the town of Kota Kinabalu (KK). We stayed in KK twice, each time for nearly a week, once in downtown KK and one stay at a beach resort. The first weekend at KK, we purchased VIP tickets for the Kota Kinabalu Jazz Festival (KKJF), an annual fund raising jazz extravaganza jointly organized by the Rotary Club of Kota Kinabalu (RCKK) and the Society of Performing Arts Kota Kinabalu Sabah. We enjoyed the amazing concert and wine. We will always remember KK and it’s refreshing, chilled wine!

In KK we ate at Welcome Seafood, you choose from fresh seafood from tanks, cooked to you specifications and delivered to your table with steamed rice and fresh vegetables. We visited a KK shopping mall where we viewed a tribal dance. During the stay at the beach resort enjoyed happy hour each evening with a few beers and great music and took a sunset cruise to view amazing sunset. We enjoyed beach time and snorkeling at close by islands.

The animal life is amazing, but don’t discount the plants on Borneo. The world’s largest flower, Rafflesia Arnoldo, is found exclusively on Sumatra and Borneo. It takes 6-8 YEARS for the transition from seed to a cabbage size bud. When it blooms, it has 5 days of perfect before it begins rotting. Weighing in at 11 kg, its known as the “corpse” flower after the distinctive aroma of rotting meat it emits to attract pollinating insects. The flower has no stems, leaves or roots. It is a parasite living on the host vine. The lifecycle of the flowers are identified by their “day”. We saw 3 flowers: in their day 5, 6, and 7. Perfect, starting to rot and in full decline.

At sunrise, we depart Kota Kinabalu for Kinabalu National Park and Poring Hot Springs, a 130 kilometer journey by car to explore the highland rainforests that nestled beneath Mt Kinabalu which tops out at 4,095 meters. By lunch time Karen was traipsing across a canopy walkway with colorful butterflies fluttering around her, some 30 meters above the forest floor. David opted to pass — he is afraid of heights. Karen paused to catch her breath – a very deep one at that, as she soaked in the magnificence of Kinabalu National Park, Malaysia’s first UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Another stop was at the Mount Kinabalu botanical garden. We saw the pitcher plant, it grows on the ground and is a carnivorous reptile living only in North Borneo. They trap insects in their pot to provide needed nitrogen back to the plant. The botanical garden is home to 1,200 types of orchids. Not that we are orchid-maniacs but it was fascinating how many are endemic to this locale. The Sexy Lady Orchid or Dancing Lady Orchid is obviously named, and we saw the smallest orchid in Borneo and perhaps the world. It is called the pinhead orchid and is 2mm across.

This trip was both easier than we thought logistically, and more interesting than we anticipated. From a logistical viewpoint, everyone spoke English (a former British Colony). Uber, soon to be Grab was plentiful, 8gb, 30day sim card of Internet was $10. Shuttle buses, and side tours were easy to get and a very good value for dollar. The food was great, the people were so gracious and friendly, it did not feel over touristic like Thailand does these days. The water is warm and turquoise, with great snorkeling and diving. Plus there were so many experiences you can only have in Borneo. This has moved in the top 2-3 places we have ever been.

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Jazmine helps an orangutan baby for a year!

Jazz and Mas, her new orangutan baby, have much in common: they both have a humbling “knowing” in their eyes, they are both very intelligent, they both make you smile, they both like to eat fruit and they both have a big interest in their finger nails. Jazz would help any animal, so when the Orangutan Rehabilitation Center said they needed help to feed the animals healthy food, Grandpa and Grandma knew Jazz would volunteer!

The plight of the world’s orang-utans has touched the hearts of many. This highly intelligent creature, sharing 97% of the same DNA as us, is lives only in Borneo and Sumatra.

Mas’ mom Analisa was born at the Rehabilitation Center in Kuching in 1996. Mas was born in 2016 on Malaysia Day. The Sarawak Forestry has updates on each of the apes every quarter.

PIT VIPERS! They didn’t mention that in the brochure!

Often, we use trip reports to guide our decision making process. We lean toward independent travel, but found a trip report on the benefits of hiring a guide for a trip to Bako National Park. Hmmmm. What would it say? well it was written by a person who was an independent traveler wondering why people hired guides — the trails are very well marked. But during her hike, she was bitten by a pit viper, a very poisonous snake, (and she preached since the traveling public does not know the habitats of poisonous snakes, a guide would be a wise investment, especially when they go down the trail first). We hired Geehay, an Iban tribesman. Besides a great tour of the park, and finding a pit viper, we chatted about the history of Sarawak and growing up in the jungle 50 years ago.

After disembarking from our boat, we headed along a boardwalk that snakes through a swampy mangrove area to the island proper. We did see some Proboscis monkeys, perched in trees foraging for seeds, leaves, mangrove shoots and unripe fruit; and we saw a wild boar. These Bornean Bearded Pigs dig in the ground with their snout to search for food (rooting). The extent of rooting was quite severe, and in some areas where numbers of feral pigs are high, they can uproot most of the ground surface. Then we headed into the jungle and along Telok Paku, one of the paths with reportedly good wildlife sightings and some amazing rainforest hiking.

About 45 sweaty minutes later, we come out to a secluded little beach at the end of the trail. After taking a short break to enjoy the views of the beach, we headed back to the trail head. As we came out into the open area of the mangrove, Lady Luck smiled upon us. There, sitting in some trees close to the boardwalk, were the Jimmy Durantes of the monkey world, the proboscis monkey. They were chowing down, climbing from tree to tree in search of food.

Sarawak (Kuching) also has an Orangutan Rehabilitation Center. Many wildlife species face the plight of endangerment for exploitive reasons (Palm Oil Plantations). On the other hand, many tourist attractions cage, hunt or manipulate wildlife in order to exploit them for commercial profit. As an animal lover and traveler, there had to be a middle ground of enjoying and learning about wildlife, while not endangering their well-being.

Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre is a 1,500 acre sanctuary established in 1975 committed to the rehabilitation of rescued and orphaned orangutans. It is not a tourist attraction, or a park to go hiking in… Semenggoh houses 28 semi-wild orangutans who are free to roam in the wild. The sanctuary is open and welcomes public to observe the orangutans only during feeding times. The rangers lead you through the forest to a raised wooden feeding area for the orangutans. Seeing orangutans is not guaranteed. If they do not make an appearance, this is actually a good thing, as it means the center has done a good job reintroducing them back to jungle life and they are able to source food in the wild.

We did see orangs; a mother and her baby, who was born in the sanctuary, and a few other apes who were taking advantage of the available food. The rangers here take their job very seriously as they throw bunches of bananas, coconuts and jackfruit are piled on the feeding platform. “We still know little about how they think and communicate,” the ranger explains, as mother and baby do somersaults. “They’re like us in so many ways, but they’re still wild creatures. Our work here is about making sure they can stay that way.”

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Why male orangutans have such weird faces

Today we are in Sarawak in Borneo and finally found a mature male orangutan. WOW! It was easy to notice they have strange flappy face-pads called flanges, which females find attractive – yet males may wait 20 years before developing them.

Mature male orangutans have large flappy cheek-pads, known as flanges. As far as females are concerned, they prefer males with them, over those without. Fully mature males are also twice the size of females and grow large throat sacs, all of which are characteristics associated with dominance. The long vocalizations of the flanged males also set them apart from an unflanged male Bornean orangutan. The long vocalizations help males to attract females.

But these traits can take a while to show. Some wild male orangutans take 20 years to grow flanges. Fully mature males are also twice the size of females and grow large throat sacs, all of which are characteristics associated with dominance.

A new study tries to explain why males take so long to grow their flanges. To discover this, researchers collected poo from 17 wild Bornean orangutans. The researchers then analyzed the hormone levels in the orangutans’ poo.

As soon as males begin to develop bigger cheek pads, their testosterone levels peak. “The very high testosterone levels of the one developing male in the study was a bit surprising but indicates the need for high testosterone levels to develop secondary sexual characteristics [such as cheek-pads]”. When a male becomes “fully-flanged”, his testosterone levels out again. As well as an advantage when it comes to finding mates, studies show that those with larger cheek pads are also healthier. Weaker and older males have shrunken flanges.

Check out the the collage at the end of the post.

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